To be exasperated at fussy/picky eaters?

[Iloveabaconbutty]

Am I being unreasonable to be exasperated at "fussy eaters"? I was brought up to eat everything on my plate although as a concession my mum and dad said we were "allowed" not to like one thing - for me as a kid it was cheese I wasn't keen on (which as an adult I've actually grown to love). I also remember my mum's slight irritation - expressed lightheatedly and privately later on - at the schoolfriend who came to tea who didn't like this, didn't like that, was picky about the other, etc. and basically left everything she had prepared on his plate.

I enjoy eating pretty much everything and we've tried to encourage out kids to be unfussy eaters too, encouraging them to "try it", when they were younger, instead of getting away with saying "no" in the first instance and finding that that was acceptable.

Except that one of our daughters, now a young adult, has quite a list of things she doesn't like and won't eat - bananas, baked beans, tomatoes, porridge, just for starters. There are a lot more things as well, with particularly strong tastes or particular textures. She's also very hesitant to try anything new or different and dislikes coffee and wine. Her boyfriend is the same which makes meal planning a bit of a challenge when he comes to stay.

I'm wondering now - having read a bit about it online and elsewhere - if I'm being unreasonable about this and if there are very real issues for some people when it comes to what tastes unpleasant? ie.they really, genuinely cannot help disliking quite a wide range of foods?

I realise that my parents were brought up in the post-war years, with rationing etc and to be a "fuss-pot" about food wouldn't have been appreciated. We were brought up like this too - and to the extent that I now appreciate a wide variety of food I'm very grateful. But is this so straightforward for some people?

some things matter more than food aversion.
Jesus, some people really don't get it.
If I attempt to eat something that i have an aversion to, I gag and vomit. So not only am I not eating the offending food and throwing up any food I have already eaten.
I physically cannot swallow certain foods. It won't go down and it's traumatic for me and those around me....do you really want me vomiting at the dinner table??
If my safe foods weren't available I would starve. End of.

I read it. They only prepared mashed potato for you and spent a lot on it? No other choices? And you’ve eaten meat as a vegetarian?

🧐

I get it. I have an autistic child. I also know someone with ARFID. They both would not be able to eat certain foods. End of.

I think certain people are deliberately trying to be offensive on here and sounding like a troll. Ironically, we shouldn’t feed them. 😉

Of course they didn’t only prepare mashed potato, why are you being obtuse 🙄

Righto, long standing MN member making reasoned points based on my own life experience and I’m a troll.

‘Sounding’ like a troll.

Ok, ‘sounding’ like a troll. Thanks for that important nuance that makes all the difference to the insult you’re throwing my way 👍

😂 Welcome

So you think it would be rude to not eat something that someone had made you, but not to eat it and visibly gag or vomit in front of them?

I called you ablest because you have minimised agoraphobia as well as sensory issues related to food. To me eating something I hate would be torture, as bad as physical pain. I'm not going to subject myself to that because snobs like you think it's rude not to.

@thekindlyone I have not minimised them, I said they are not matters of survival, based on my extensive experience in humanitarian crises where survival is very much in the balance.

So because you've never come across someone who would rather starve that eat unsafe food or burn than leave the house, they can't exist?

And you're not just talking about survival, you're talking about politeness. It's apparently rude not to force yourself to eat food that makes you gag and vomit.

It's disturbing that you (allegedly) work with vulnerable people given your apparent lack of empathy.

I was brought up with "how do you know you don't like it until you try it". Also lied to about the taste of food, i.e courgette tastes like cucumber.🤔Also over the years, I have periodically tried honey. Still don't like it.

I have never pushed my child to eat something he says he doesn't like, although I do ask the question I was always asked. How do you get a child too eat without it becoming a battle and highly traumatic?

My mother challenged me with 'How do you know you don't like black pudding if you have never tasted it?', and I tasted it, and she was right, I loved it. And many other things. It can be a valid approach.

Yes it's a valid approach but not when it's forced on you after you've said no thanks several times.

Wouldn’t it make more sense to, as I always do, explain upon accepting an invitation that ‘I’d be happy to come, how kind. I’ll just make you aware I am vegetarian and cannot eat meat or fish - shall I bring something?’

I think it’s ridiculous doormat behaviour in the extreme for a vegetarian to sit eating meat because it’s ‘polite.’

It’s not doormat behaviour at all. When I turn up in a war zone or a refugee camp, I eat whatever is prepared for me. Because it do otherwise when people are starving/rationing/cooking in rudimentary conditions for hours on end would be crass in the extreme. I have been clear in all my posts that I’m taking about pretty extreme situations. In normal circumstances of course people have food preferences and they can absolutely say so. I would always check with guests in advance (though if they came back with a list of five beige ‘safe foods’ I’d rebrand their invite as coming for coffee). But normal ‘please do give me mushrooms’ etc I’m all for.

I am talking about survival actually. A lot of people here are saying ‘I’d rather starve’ when they have no idea what it’s like to see people starve. Not much reflection on how fucking tone deaf that is on this thread.

And yes, it’s also about being a bit mindful of what it took someone to put that food in front of you. In the places I work it can be a full days labour for a woman (always a woman) to put a meal on the table. Food can be more than 50% of a family’s weekly budget. It can be food or school fees. And yet they feed visitors out of love for the stranger. So yes, it’s not politeness as such but it is having some sensitivity about global poverty and norms around food.

So, similar to the ‘starving children in Africa would eat it,’ pretty irrelevant. You’re happy to eat meat it whatever else when you’re given it. Many people aren’t. And why should they?

Well it’s not irrelevant to me because it’s my life 🤣 You can’t just put anything you don’t like in your irrelevant file, ffs.

I’m not saying people should eat meat if they don’t want to. I have one specific example of a time when I did, because it was the right thing to do in the context. Because sometimes not being an enormous fucking twat to people who have nothing is more important than ‘I don’t like it’.

Saying that ‘starving children in Africa would eat anything’ is totally irrelevant to the op’s irritation with a daughter who doesn’t drink wine or eat baked beans. Eating anything that’s given to you by choice is irrelevant to people not wanting to eat olives or offal - it doesn’t make those people who don’t eat anything given to them somehow wrong.

I mean I’ve literally said over and over that in routine circumstances it’s fine to have preferences and most people will be tolerant of that.

I take issue with ‘I’d rather starve’ - starving people are not a metaphor for people who gag on carrots and want to make clear how serious their dislike is. Live within narrow food horizons if you like, but let’s not act like it’s life or death.

I don’t think we’re getting anywhere really.

As I’ve said upthread, I work with children fitted with feeding tubes. They are fitted with these because, proven by them being hospitalised, they would literally rather starve than eat unapproved foods, leading to them becoming dangerously underweight.

But for the same reasons I take issue with ‘starving children in a refugee camp would eat it,’ because it’s not relevant to the op’s irritation with her daughter who doesn’t want to drink wine or eat porridge. There’s lots of things we could/would do if we lived in extreme poverty. That is no reason why we should do these things now.

I don’t know how many more times I can say that it’s fine to have preferences. People won’t starve rather than eat stuff they dislike though, it’s bullshit. Largely because they will always have alternatives (yay, prosperity!) but even if not they’d shovel it down in the end.

Were talking in circles, I’m done.

what does it actually matter, its up to them and nothing to do with you, snob

I think I know better than you whether I'd rather starve thanks. You're the one being tone deaf towards people with autism or eating disorders or sensory issues.

And you still haven't explained how saying no thanks when someone has cooked you a meal is more rude than gagging, vomiting and essentially torturing yourself.